Elohistic and the ■writing alphabetical, cannot ascend even to the tenth century before c. •
and that, being based upon the harmonic scale of 7 notes, in accordance with the erroneous
planetary system of Chaldaic magianism (of 5 planets, and the sun and moon) ; it is an arbitrary
human production, founded upon ignorance of the physical laws and phenomena of
Nature — as this Nature is unfolded by science in the nineteenth century.
In consequence, did geologists pretend to arrange the dozen, or more, distinct creations
manifested in the earth’s crust through rocky stratifications and different fossil remains
(divided from each other by immeasurable periods of interjected time), according to the
“ 7 musical notes” of Genesis, they would perpetrate a caricature of God’s works more
gross, and less excusable, than that of Cos'M.AS-Indicopleustes : at the same time that they
would make parade of stolid ignorance of philology and biblical exegesis such as every Orientalist,
versed in archeology, must laugh to scorn. On the other hand (whether practical
gjj geology ” be or be not a fiction), were a philologist at the present day*to argue, that the
‘writer of “ Genesis i-ii. 3 ” possessed more knowledge between the fifth and tenth centuries
before c., than Cosmas did in the sixth after that era, his logic would establish two things:
1st, his absolute ignorance of geology; 2d, of every principle of historical criticism.
Indifferent, ourselves, to the self-appropriation, by either side, of one or both of these
branches of the alternative, we cannot leave the “ Deluge” without one observation; the
force- of which theologers and geologists would do well to keep constantly in view. It is,
that this genesiacal Flood is inseparable from NuKA’s Ark, or boat. "Without the buoyant
convenience of the latter, let ethnographers remember, the entire human race would h&ve
been drowned in the former.
We could quote areal historian, and living divine, who seriously speaks of Noah as “ the
great navigator.” We have seen a wondrous plate of the “Ark,” (359) exhibiting the No-
achic family pursuing their domestic and zoological avocations with the placidity of a Yan
Amburgh, and the luxuriousness of a Lucullus. We have read abundant descriptions of this
diluvian packet-ship, in ecclesiastical and ponderous tomes, “.usque ad nauseam.” But,
there is no work that does such pains-taking justice to the “ Ark; ” there is no man -who,
has exhausted Noachian seamanship, antediluvian ship-building,’ cataclysmal proprieties,
human and animal (from the “ leopard lying down with the kid ” in their berth, to the
cheerful smartness of Ham the cabin-boy)—than Father Kircher, (360) almost two centuries
ago. It is a shame that some great publisher does .not reprint such a sterling good work,
abounding in plates; as it might be a most useful field-manual to the orthodox geologist,
and pleasing, at the same time, to children. Unable to do adequate honor to the Arkite
researches of this Herculsean Jesuit, we must be content with the lucid description, in
plain English, of the Rev. Dr. Lightfoot; who, living above two hundred years nearer to
the Deluge than ourselves, no doubt knew considerably more than we do about the vessel
that survived it. (361)
“ The dimensions of the Arke were such, as that it had contained 450,000 square cubits
within the walls of it, if it had risen in an exact square unto the top; but it sloping in the
roofe, like the roofe of an house, till it came to be but a cubit broad in the ridge of it,’did
abate some good parcell of that summe, but how much is uncertain; should we allow4 50,000
cubits in the abatement, yet will the space be sufficient enough of capacity, to receive all
the creatures, and all their provisions that were laid in there. The building was three
stories high, but of the staires that rose from story to story, the Text is silent; in every
story were partitions, not so many, as to seclude one kinde of creature from another,
for that was needlesse, there being no enmity between them, while they were there, and it
would have been more troublesome to Noah to bring their provisions to them: but there
were such partitions, as to divide betwixt be'asts and their provisions in store: .betwixt
provisions and provisions, that by lying neer together might receive dammage. The doore
was in the side of the lowest story, and so it was under water all the time of the flood; but
God by so speciall a providence had shut them in, that it leaked not. In what story every
kinde of creature had its lodging and habitation, is a matter undeterminable; how their
excrements were conveyed out of the Arke, and water conveyed in, the Text hath con-
(359) Yeades : Dissertation on the Antiquity, Origin, and Design o f the principal Pyramids o f Egypt ; London,
1833; pp. 9,10, and pi. i.
(360) De Area Not; 1 vol. fol., Amsterdam, 1675.
(361) The Harmony, Chronicle, and Order o f the Old Testament ; London, 1647; ch. vi. pp. 8, 9.
cealed. All the creatures were so cicurated and of a tamed condition.for this time, that
they lived together, and dieted together without dissention : The wolf dwelte with the lamb,
and the leopard lay down with the hid^ and the calf and the young lion together : and Noah or
any of his family might come among lions, dragons, serpents, and they had forgot the
wildness and cruelty of their nature, and did not meddle with him.”
Chronology, therefore, among men of science, possesses relation neither to the unknown
epoch of the “ Deluge,” nor to that of the “ Creation.” These events, scientifically un-
seizable, are abandoned by positivists to theological tenacity.
Archoeologists, in efforts to re-arrange the World’s occurrences from the chaos into which
ecclesiastical presumption had cast them, now pursue an altogether different process of
inquiry. Beginning from to-day\ as a fixed point in history if not in universal nature, (362)
they retrograde, as closely as possible, year by year to the Christian era ; said to be 1 %3
years backwards from the present year. From that assumed point, chronologers continue
to retrocede, year by year, so long as history or monuments warrant such annual registration
of events: but when, owing to absence of record or to confusion of accounts, the
impossibility of identifying a given date for a given occurrence becomes manifest, they
endeavor to define it approximately within a few years, more or less. In the ratio of their
recession into the mists of antiquity, so does the possibility of fixing an approximate epoch
diminish ; and, therefore, it becomes necessary to group a given number of events into
masses; which conventional masses become larger and less distinctly marked in proportion
as they are remote from that era we call “ the Christian.”
The era of the miraculous birth of J e sus was the stand-point of chronologisfs ; the
pivot upon which every modern system turns. How minutely precise to the mathematician
this era is, may be perceived, by archoeologists, at a glance.
E pochs op th e Na t iv it y .
According to 3 authorities Year of Rome Year "before C.
—Tillemont, Mann, Priestley................................ . 747
“ 4 f; Kepler, Capellus, Dodwell, Pagi............................ 748 .. (C 5 « Chrysostom, Petavius, Prideaux, Playfair, Hales 749 ..
2 “ Sulpitius Severus, Usher............................. 750 ... « 8 te Iren«us, Tertullian, Clemens Alex., Eusebius,
Syncellus, Baronius, Calvisius, Vossius...... 751 ...
ft 7 « Epiphanius, Jerome, Orosius, Bede, Salian, Sigonius,
Scaliger............................................ 752 ... 1 3 tt Alexander Dionysius, Luther, Labbseus.............. 753 ...
The moment öf the Nativity is, consequently, zero ...
(( 1 «
« » 1 « Paul of Middleburgb...................................... . 755 ... ... « 1 I Ly d ia t............................ . gwaes...... .... 756 ...
Year after C.
1
E f c * 2
3
35 authorities, of the most orthodox schools, here differ among themselves ten years
about the era of the grandest preternatural event in human annals; which event is itself
dependent in epoch upon the implied accuracy of a date—Anno tTrbis Conditce,'the “ year
of the building of Rome that, in his next pages, the Rev. Dr. Hales (363) shows to be
fluctuating, according to six date3 established by 34 chronologists, between the assumed year
b. c. 753 and b. c. 627!
And this is what theologers term “ chronology.” In the American edition of Calmet,(364)
the date of the Nativity appears thus (the reader being free to adopt, in a free country,
whichever date he pleases)— the editor naively remarking, “ It must, however, be borne in
mind, that the particularity of the dates here assigned rests chiefly on mere conjecture”!—
Y o a r o f World. B e fo r e Christ. B e f o r e a . d . Year o f Christ.
Calmed. H a l e s . Calmed. Calmed.
400 0 5 4 1
r r l nuMBOLDT: Cosmos-, i.p.178; note, on “ TheEnglish Sunday” !
net\ Srcm AnalV-sis o/Ohron.; 1830; i. pp. 214, 217; Glid don : chapters; 1843; p. 33; and Olia; 1849; p 4!
(404) Dictionary; “ Chronological Table;” 1832; pp. 947, 9Sl. 84